Saturday, November 5, 2011

Can a burger be gourmet? It can, at Le Gourmet Burger!

Truth is, Gourmet Burger is a pretty popular spot with the students. It's right downtown, near Concordia, and serves great burgers to boot, so of course I was gonna check it out. While they didn't serve the best burgers I've ever had in my life, Gourmet Burger definitely blows the surrounding competition out of the water. The neighbouring A&W's and Mickey D's ain't got nothing on this burger joint.

Accessibility - Grade: A
It's right next to Concordia University, so it's about a five minute walk from Guy-Concordia metro.

Service - Grade: B
Since you go up to the counter and order your meal like you do at fast food restaurants, service isn't much of a factor here. The staff was friendly, but the service was pretty standard. You might have to wait a bit for your meal, though, since they cook everything on the spot.

Food - Grade: B

The menu there is pretty basic. You order the type of meat you want in your burger, which usually comes with caramelized onions, tomatoes and lettuce, and you order whatever extra ingredients you want for $1 extra per ingredient, and you order whatever sides you want.

Beef Burger

As I mentioned earlier, their burgers aren't the best I've had, but for a fast-food downtown joint, they're still pretty good. Their beef is fresh, and has that nice smokey taste of meat fresh off the grill. And guess what? In this burger, the bottom bun isn't a total reject! It has sesame seeds on it too! Ohohoho!

Now for the downsides. I wasn't crazy about the caramelized onions, because I like the juicy zyng that fresh onions tend to give the burger. The patty wasn't as meaty as the one at, say, Burger de Ville, but it was still thicker and juicier than the ones you'd find in fast-food franchises. Depending on your luck, the guy at the grill might overcook your burger a bit. My final complaint and biggest complaint is the dryness of the burger. The bun is too thick, dry and untoasted. Usually, when you're halfway through a burger, the juices from the patty and the ingredients tend ot soak into the bun so that it becomes compact. But this time, either the buns were too thick and fluffy, or there wasn't enough juice in the ingredients.

Sweet potato fries

﻿This. Honestly, this is the reason why I like this restaurant so much. The sweet potato fries are pure starchy AWESOMENESS. They're fried to a perfect golden-brown crisp, and salted just lightly enough to bring out the natural sweetness of the sweet potato. Couple that with the tingly kick from their special spicy mayo or wasabi mayo dip and you, my friend, get a party in your mouth. Bonus! They're the same price as regular fries, and you can even get a cone of half-half. AND they're served to you in a pretty spiral thingy that looks like it came straight out of an IKEA catalogue! ...What? I'm not superficial at all...

My meal

﻿I also ordered their house iced-tea, and tried their house lemonade. The iced tea was decent, but wasn't anything worth raving about. The lemonade, on the other hand, was pretty interesting. It had a floral taste to it, which kinda reminded me of a lemonade with lavender water that I had tried previously. I personally found that the floral taste left a pleasant flavour in your mouth, but I think it really depends on the person.

Price - $

This place is cash only, but in return, they don't charge taxes. Or rather, the tax is already included. So whatever price you see on the menu is the price that you'll pay. My burger was $6, the fries $3, and the drink $2, so my bill was a flat $11.

Final Grade: B

So final word is that Gourmet Burger is a great place to grab a quick bite if you're downtown and looking for a quality burger without all the fancy shmancy add-ons. And for the sake of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, try their sweet potato fries!